[Sonic] The Last Frontier: Ch. 7

Sonic...Sonic...wake up...
I heard what sounded like Sally Acorn's voice speaking to me.  But that couldn't be right, could it?  Wasn't I still...
"Sonic...GIT UP!"
I jolted awake, still lying there on the floor.  Sandy had been standing over me with her hands on her hips, before walking over to the window to throw open the curtains and flood my face with bright morning light.  I shielded my eyes and sat up, yawning.  I wasn't feeling nearly as rested as the previous morning; whether that was from being worn out by all the running yesterday, or if I had simply slept fewer hours, I wasn't sure.
"I'm sorry about that, Sandy.  Did I oversleep?" I mumbled.
She shook her head.  "No, but we ain't gonna git to the capital any time soon if we sleep the whole day away."

I gave her my pillow and bed sheet, and she made the bed neatly.  After gathering our belongings, we headed downstairs to leave, passing by the dining room where we saw the old squirrel caretaker seated at a long wooden table alongside half a dozen other people (presumably the other guests), eating breakfast.
She noticed us walking by and called out, "Going so soon?  I hope y'all have time to sit a spell and have somethin' to eat first.  It's included in the cost of the room."
Sandy and I exchanged glances and decided we did have time, so we picked the last two empty chairs and sat down.  The caretaker got up and walked to the kitchen, returning shortly afterward with two plates of bacon, eggs, and toast, and then made a second trip carrying two tin cups of steaming coffee.  We ate and thanked the caretaker for her hospitality, and waved goodbye to everyone who was present.  We headed over to the stable where Sandy left Petunia for the night, and after she saddled up, we trotted over to the tiny railroad platform at the edge of Oro Valley to gauge its size and level of activity, since that was what allegedly saved this town from extinction.  No train was parked there at the time, though I did spot three or four people seated at benches along the platform, so I guess one was scheduled to come sometime today.

We, on the other hand, didn't have time to sit around, so we followed the tracks out of town, continuing in what felt like the same northeast direction.  The adrenaline shock from being woken up earlier this morning was now starting to wear off, and although the coffee helped somewhat, it wasn't enough to keep me at the top of my game.  Keeping up with Sandy and Petunia suddenly wasn't so effortless as it had been before, and over the course of the first thirty minutes or so, I actually found myself trailing behind on two separate occasions.  Sandy was keeping focused on the path ahead, so I doubt she noticed when I had to sprint to catch up.  But once we'd gotten past the two chains of hills that nestled Oro Valley, the land got flat as a pancake.  That may have been good for travel, but now my eyes had run out of interesting things to look at along the way, and just like the leg of our trip between Brownwood and Gila Bend, my mind went into autopilot mode and I spaced out.  That's probably why I didn't see the rock half-hidden by the tall grass.  I tripped over it and careened through the air for a split second before skidding to a stop on my face.  I groaned, and I could hear the rumbling of Petunia's hoof prints taper to a stop.

"Whoa, Sonic, what happened?" I heard Sandy ask, as I pushed myself off the ground and brushed the dirt and grass off of my face.
I didn't want to tell her the truth about spacing out from not getting enough sleep, so I said "I didn't see that rock in the tall grass.  I'm OK."
That did remind me, however, of the nightmare I thought Sandy was having last night, and I took a chance by asking her about it.  She didn't say anything at first, so I guess she didn't want to talk about it.
But then she admitted "Did I say all that out loud?" mildly blushing.  "Well, I don't know how much ya heard, but I dreamt we'd just gotten back to Whispering Gulch only to find we were too late to save it.  The place was empty and most of the buildin's were gone, like at Gila Bend."
"Well, we're not too late yet," I replied, trying to be reassuring.  "I promise we'll find out what's going on with these towns and this railroad."

We continued for about another hour before reaching a noteworthy landmark: a river crossing our path.  It was wider (or at least had more water in it) than the one we'd ran alongside yesterday, and on the other side was a small cluster of short bluffs.  It didn't even appear on our map, so it came as a surprise.  I told Sandy to stay in place for a moment while I dashed downriver for a mile or so, then the same distance upriver; I didn't see any reasonable way to skirt it.  The railroad tracks we'd been following, continued straight across the river on a wooden trestle bridge, probably built for that very purpose.  The relatively fresh appearance of its lumber made me think it was built sometime within the last 12 months.  As for rigidity, if this thing was designed to hold the weight of a moving train and its cargo, it could certainly stand up to a hedgehog, a squirrel, and a horse.  For me, crossing the river on the bridge was a no-brainer; Sandy, on the other hand, was much more apprehensive.  She pointed out that the bridge had no safety rails or wooden side-walks or anything more than the bare minimum of rails and support structure -- she and Petunia would be forced into crossing by walking on the spaced ties.

I crossed first, dashing over to the other side of the river in the blink of an eye.  I turned around to watch Sandy and Petunia follow, and just like with the rickety foot bridge two days ago, Sandy dismounted and started walking backwards.  Leading Petunia by the reins, she took each step precariously while also keeping an eye on all of her horse's four legs.  I certainly didn't fault her for wanting to cross as safely as possible, but part of me did wish she could move along just a little bit quicker.  When she was about halfway across, I thought I heard something on the breeze, and looked around for its source.  I didn't see anything, but then I heard the sound again, soft but steady, coming from the other side of the bluffs.  I could also see a long, white, puffy cloud slowly rising over the bluffs.  But I didn't think to connect the two...until I saw a TRAIN coming around the bend!  I gasped, and spun around to warn Sandy, but the train did a fine job of that on its own by laying on its steam whistle the moment it saw us ahead.

Sandy's head whipped around and she screamed in horror, and just then, Petunia's reins slipped out of her hands as the horse recoiled on its hind legs.  Turning back was out of the question, so Sandy leaped up to grab the reins again and started sprinting in my direction, dragging Petunia behind her.  The train had hit its brakes with loud screeching, but it was moving too fast for it to be able to stop in time.  Part of me wanted to cover my eyes and curl up into a ball, not wanting to witness the front of the train plow right through my traveling partner in a shower of blood and guts, but deep down I had faith that she'd make it off that bridge alive.  By some miracle, nobody's foot missed a step on the spaced rail ties, and they both made it all the way across the bridge and off the tracks...about two seconds before the locomotive and its dozen or so trailing cars came rolling through.  I stepped out of their way as they skidded to a stop; Petunia was breathing hard, and Sandy was still shaking violently from the nerves.  She opened her mouth to speak but the words wouldn't come out.  I had to calm her down somehow, and without regard to how she might have felt about being touched, I wrapped my arms around her, gently but firmly, patting her on the back.
"Th-thank you, Sonic," she muttered, resting her head on my shoulder.  I guess she didn't care in that moment either.
When she stopped shaking and both our heartbeats slowed to a somewhat normal rate, I let go and stood a step back from her.  "From now on, perhaps we ought to think twice before crossing railroad bridges," I suggested.
Sandy looked back at the bridge we just crossed, and shuddered.  "I'm with ya there."

Lucky for us, that proved to be the only railroad trestle we had to cross to reach the territory capital.  Morning turned into afternoon as we continued following the rails, always on the lookout for something that broke the monotony of dry grassland and the occasional tree.  Besides Oro Valley, the completed section of railroad track also took us through the communities of Corona, Warm Springs, and Eagle Nest (in that order).  They all seemed to be spaced just far enough apart to make them convenient rest stops along our journey.  We did spend a few minutes in each town looking around for clues that fit our evolving theory of the government forcibly emptying towns and re-populating them later.  None of them showed any obvious indicators, and the few people with whom we spoke, didn't seem to have any idea of what we were talking about.  (Of course, I had to carefully phrase my words about the governmental eviction so as not to set off a widespread panic.)  Corona, however, appeared to have a similar story to Oro Valley, becoming a boom town for a couple of months, only to shrink to nothing.  All who answered our questions reported seeing increases in population from the arrival of the railroad, just like in Oro Valley.
"OK, so the railroad does seem to help these towns grow a bit," Sandy remarked.  "Still can't figger out, though, why some towns had to get the boot first."
She agreed with me that there had to be some kind of connection between the railroad company and the territory government; we'd seen too many examples for it all to be just coincidence.

Past Eagle Nest came several more hours of travel before I could see the territory capital looming in the distance.  Despite only being stuck in the Old West for a few days, I'd already grown accustomed to the sight of little movie-set towns everywhere I went, which made the capital look that much more immense in comparison.  While I'd say it wasn't quite as large as a modern metropolis, it certainly wasn't something a person on horseback could ride through in 30 seconds.
With our destination imminent, I began veering off our railroad guide into the heart of the city, but Sandy advised "Let's not split off from the train tracks just yet.  We're bound to find a rail yard or a depot if we stick to our guns."
So we continued running right on either side of the tracks.  I'd say it was an adjustment for the both of us when the grass and hard-packed dirt underneath our feet started transitioning to the brick paving of city streets, as well as seeing hundreds (rather than only dozens) of people around, human and anthrope in approximately equal numbers, shuffling about their business.

About six blocks into the city, we had to come to a stop.  A rail yard was ahead, where the one set of tracks branched into six, but it was surrounded on all sides by a heavy-looking iron fence, and a gate across the tracks prevented us from entering.  However, the low occupancy in the rail yard (only two of the six tracks had passenger or freight cars parked on them) made it easy to see that the tracks continued past that point.  We took a guess of which direction the track curved, then continued our journey on the streets...unexpectedly getting caught up in a 19th-century "rush hour" of stagecoaches and horse-drawn carts.  We broke through the crowd a few minutes later, turning onto a side street with much less traffic, and Sandy asked one of the passersby, a teenage fox, where we could find a train depot.  She didn't know, but a darker-skinned adult human who was nearby either overheard our conversation or noticed the bright blue of my quills; in any case, he knew where one was located, and we followed his directions, progressing a few blocks ahead and making a right turn.  (All the streets in this city seemed to be laid out in an orderly, grid-like manner, which certainly proved helpful to weary travelers like us.)

The atmosphere of this capital city was certainly different from Whispering Gulch and the other isolated towns; there was a greater sense of permanence here, with brick buildings significantly outnumbering wooden ones.  That's why I was only half-surprised when we finally spotted the train depot: it too had an elaborate brick construction, with a wide, arching roof.  Once Sandy dismounted and we stepped through its heavy iron-and-glass arched doors, it looked cavernous inside.  Bands of iron ribs supported the roof from the inside and a row of plate-glass windows could be seen all along the top of the walls, in which streamed the light of the early evening sun.  Three parallel tracks had their end points here, and the one farthest from the entrance had a five-car steam locomotive parked, waiting for passengers.

To our right were three interconnected wooden booths where tickets could be purchased, and on the wall next to those, there looked to be some large poster, at least six feet square.  A closer inspection revealed it to be a railroad map that covered the whole territory.  From the capital city, we saw two lines heading eastward to some place off the map, and just like the overseer in White Rock said, three routes branched out from the capital: one going northwest, one due west, and one south-southwest (the one we had followed to get here).  Focusing in particular on the route we knew, a solid black line indicated the track was completed and in service going down to Oro Valley, with a dotted line extending out to White Rock that probably signified a segment that was still under construction.  Since we knew that to be true and current, it followed that the other two lines, which appeared to travel roughly the same distance away from the capital, were also blazing new trails into the frontier.

"Sandy, do you think the towns along these other two routes might have gotten evicted too?" I asked.
"I don't know, but I can tell ya we're gonna find out soon enough," she quipped.
And with that, she walked over to one of the open ticket booths, and started talking with the attendant in that gentle-but-firm tone of voice.
"Say, I got a couple'a questions about yer railroad.  Can ya tell me where yer gonna be buildin' these lines?"
The attendant, with a small waxed mustache and a flat-topped hat, matter-of-factly replied "I saw you reading our map on the wall.  That is the most current representation of how far our railway travels, and where it plans to expand."
"No, I mean beyond that," Sally retorted.  "Ain't ya got a whole list'a towns the railroad's gonna be goin' through or somethin'?  Maybe there's some other fella here who actually knows what the company's plannin'?"
"I'm afraid there's no one here at this station who has that information," he stated, looking slightly annoyed but trying to remain professional.  "You might be able to find an answer at our corporate offices, which are also here in town.  Look for the five-story red-brick building in the center of town."
And right after that, he put up a "CLOSED" placard in front of his booth and walked away.
Gee, Sandy, we haven't even been here in town for an hour yet, and it seems you're already making enemies, I thought.
Sandy shot me a dirty look, but didn't say anything.  It was then that I realized I'd been thinking out loud, and I clamped my mouth shut.

We exited the train station and Sandy saddled up on Petunia again.
"'The five-story red-brick building in the center of town'," Sandy repeated mockingly.  "Could he have been any less specific?"
"Do you want me to take a quick run through most of the city?" I offered.  "You could stay right here and I--"
"Nah, that ain't necessary.  You'd probably git caught up in traffic again.  Might even git yourself lost...this ain't no one-horse town.  Let's just stick together and keep an eye out.  And ask around some more if we gotta."
As it turned out, though, we didn't really need a specific address.  Although the capital city might have sprawled across the prairie, very few of the buildings were greater than two stories tall.  I dashed up the wall and arched roof of the train station, then did a total panoramic sweep of everything.  In the distance, I saw two red-brick buildings that rose above the rest, and reported my findings to Sandy.

The evening traffic was already starting to clear up somewhat, so we were able to cut through the city streets at a fairly decent pace.  We headed north for about fifteen blocks until we could see the two tall buildings to our west, and then we turned.  By coincidence, the buildings were on the same street, three blocks apart.  We stopped in front of the one we encountered first, and I went inside to inquire about whether that was the one we were looking for.  A person in the lobby was quick to point me back outside toward the other one, and upon seeing that one up close, it was clear why: this one had "HARRINGTON-MORGAN RAILWAY" carved in stone above the entrance doors.  Sandy dismounted, tied Petunia to a nearby hitching post, and we both walked up the steps and through the door.  The lobby was surprisingly lavish: I saw a glass chandelier suspended from the two-story ceiling, leather armchairs to sit and wait in, an elaborate mural on the back wall illustrating a steam locomotive barreling through the western frontier, and twin curved wooden staircases that looked to be covered in glossy lacquer.  In the middle of the room, in front of the staircases, was an ornate wooden desk with a middle-aged human woman seated behind it, wearing some kind of slim reading glasses as she penned something down on a writing pad.
Sandy started "Excuse me, ma'am, but is there someone here we could talk to about--"
The woman (probably a receptionist) looked up and held up a hand to interrupt Sandy.  "I'm sorry, but business is closed for the day.  If you wish to speak with someone, come back tomorrow and I can help you set up an appointment."

Sandy didn't say anything as she turned around and left, but once we were both outside, she growled in frustration.
"Don't take it personally, Sandy," I said, trying to calm her down.  "We just got here in the city too late in the day.  We'll have all day tomorrow to continue our investigation.  How about we get something to eat and then sleep it off?"
Sandy let out a long sigh.  "I don't know how we'll manage to do that, Sonic.  When I packed supplies at home for our trip, I didn't really think we'd have to travel all the way to the capital to get some answers.  We're out of food, we've got almost no water left, and I'm down to my last two dollars."
"Well, what about that revolver we stole from the outlaw all the way back in the mountains?" I inquired.  "I think you still have it stashed in your bag.  Even if we don't have any bullets for it, there's bound to be some place around here that'll buy it from us."
"I got my doubts 'bout any gunsmith wantin' to buy some stolen, secondhand revolver...but it wouldn't hurt to try.  Let's ask around and see if we can find one."

The capital was certainly a big town, so it didn't surprise me when the first person we asked didn't know where we could find a gun shop, nor did the next four people after that.  Finally, one did tell us that the nearest shop was four blocks south and two blocks east...and was scheduled to close in about ten minutes.
"I'll take the gun, Sandy, and I'll dash right over there.  Catch up as quickly as you can; we've gotta get there before it closes."
So I took the mostly empty canvas bag with the revolver in it, and five or so seconds later, I screeched to a stop in front of "Honest Ed's Firearms Emporium."  This one-story wooden building had more of a rustic look to it, evocative of all those little businesses I found in the towns on the frontier.  I pushed the door open and headed inside, where the sole occupant was standing behind a glass counter with various models of handguns on display.

"Well, hey there, blue...fellow," the shopkeeper said, who apparently had never seen another hedgehog like me before.  "I'm about to close up shop for the day, but I'll never turn away a customer who wants to purchase one of these fine--"
"Actually," I interrupted, "I was hoping you were in the market to buy guns as well as sell them.  I've got one here, and granted, it's secondhand, but..."
"Secondhand gun, eh?" he pondered.  "Well, my customers normally prefer buyin' brand-new guns, but I might be willin' to take it off your hands.  Depends on the model and the condition.  Why don't you show me what you got."
I pulled the gun from the sack and placed it atop the counter.  The shopkeeper didn't hesitate to pick it up and start examining it in the light.
"Looks like an 1873 Colt Peacemaker...and it's the civilian model," he muttered, taking a pair of calipers to measure the length of its barrel.  "I sell a lot of these, so I've already got plenty in stock.  I would have said no, but this one's got the ivory hand grip and the nickel plating...Colt didn't make too many of 'em in this style.  You've got yourself a diamond in the rough here, and after a little cleanin' and polishin', I'd be proud to put this piece up for sale."

"How'd you manage to get a hold of this?" he asked me, and that's when I froze.  If I told him the truth, he'd certainly throw me out of the store.  But luckily for me, right then, Sandy showed up outside.  The shopkeeper was about to shoo her away on account of being closed for the day, but I explained that she was with me.
So he asked Sandy, and she said "Believe it or not, we got it from an outlaw who got a little too cocky."
I gave her an "are you crazy?" stare, but then she continued: "Yeah, he thought he was the best poker player around.  Sure, he won the first few hands, but then he got greedy and started betting everything he had.  Other players got all his cash, and the two of us ended up with his prized six-shooter."
"Imagine that," the shopkeeper said.
Sandy and the shopkeeper spent a few minutes haggling over the price.  I guess Sandy felt she wasn't getting enough for the weapon, so she broke out a (true) sob story of how we both came from a distant frontier town, and we'd spent several days traveling hundreds of miles to reach this city, and we didn't have enough money for lodging for the night.

"Honest Ed" didn't show much emotion past that point, but paid Sandy what I guess was a handsome sum for our stolen revolver.
"Now I do have to close up," he mentioned.  "But if you're lookin' for a place to stay, there's a little hole-in-the-wall boardinghouse a few blocks from here.  Tell 'em that Honest Ed sent ya, and I'm sure they'll give you a great deal."
After we walked outside and Sandy saddled up on Petunia again, I said "That was nice of him, suggesting a place to stay.  And it's not too far from here, apparently...let's go check it out."
"We are not gonna do that, Sonic, and I'll tell ya why.  He was a fast-talking shyster, and I've known a few of them in my day.  Think about it...he knows we're from out of town, he knows we're carryin' cash, and we just sold 'im the only gun we had.  And, he just so happens to be closin' up shop...sounds like the perfect time to hightail it over to the boardin' house."
"And you're thinking that if we took his advice, we'd be walking into some kind of ambush?"
She nodded.  "Let's get a few blocks away from here first, and then start askin' around for reputable places of lodging."

The sun was setting quickly by this point, and the number of people out on the street was dwindling fast.  Nevertheless, we stopped to ask passersby about finding a hotel or something along those lines.  Sandy insisted on getting the names of at least two different places, after which we chose to first check out a four-story hotel with adjacent livery.  The tan bricks were fairly easy to spot in the evening twilight, illuminated by lanterns dangling from the portico.
Sandy dismounted, and then said "Sonic, stay here with Petunia while I go inside and figure out how much this is gonna cost."
Ten minutes later, she returned.  "Even at their cheapest rates, it's a bit more than I had wanted to pay, but I didn't wanna gallop all over the city, not after all we've been through today.  I bought us one night's stay, and that covers a spot for Petunia in the livery."

We led Petunia over to the livery, and Sandy talked with the attendant, who in turn led Petunia into a waiting spot.  The two of us then walked in the hotel itself, and after getting a good look at how fancily decorated the lobby was, I could see why Sandy had to pay so much.  There was a dining establishment on the property, which saved us the trouble of having to go back out again for food.  This one did offer a choice of things to eat, and both Sandy and I opted for something a little easier to digest than barbecue: big bowls of beef-and-vegetable soup.  After that, I followed Sandy up the stairs to our room on the third floor.

The room had the amenities one would expect from a typical hotel room, similar to that home we stayed at in Oro Valley, although with carpeted floor this time.  Sandy opened the large window on the wall to let in some ventilation, and then she said "All I wanna do right now is just draw a bath and soak for a bit.  Is that OK with you, Sonic?"
I was fine with that, so I let her go first and unwind as needed.
Before she closed the bathroom door, I heard her say "Well, fancy that!  They've got one of them newfangled flushing toilets in here!"
Her exclamation made me realize just how much I'd taken modern plumbing for granted.

She spent quite a bit of time in the bathroom -- I guess she really was in need of a relaxing soak.  Just as I started contemplating the possibility that she'd accidentally fallen asleep in the tub, the door opened and she came out, drying off her hair with a towel.  "It's all yours now, Sonic.  Thanks again."
I entered next, and both the sink and the bathtub looked to be cast-iron with a porcelain coating.  The toilet was an old-fashioned style with elevated tank and a pull-chain flush...and judging from the smell in the room, Sandy had clearly made use of more than just the bathtub.  But eh, what could I do?  I drew a fresh bath of water and took off my gloves and shoes before easing on in.  The water felt a tad chilly (probably neither artificially heated nor cooled), but I grew accustomed to it the longer I was in it.  I dunked my head for a moment to give my sweaty quills a scrub, and after that, followed Sandy's lead of just soaking in the water for a while, leaning my back against the sloped wall of the tub.

I climbed out, dried off, and re-entered the room to find Sandy in bed but not yet asleep.  Intending to do the same thing as last night, I grabbed a pillow off the bed and asked Sandy to hand me a sheet so I could sleep on the floor.
But Sandy said "You don't have to do that, Sonic.  I saw how uncomfortable you looked sleepin' on the floor last night.  This bed is big enough for the both of us...I don't mind sharin' it with ya."
"Are you sure?" I asked, secretly wanting to sleep in the bed this time but not wanting to admit it.  "You've been so generous already, Sandy, and I don't want to impose..."
"Well, I wouldn't have been able to pay for this bed and this room if we didn't have that six-shooter, and we wouldn't have gotten that from the outlaw if you hadn't kept him distracted.  So the way I see it, you've earned the right."

Sandy asked me to shut the window, leaving it open just a crack so it didn't get stuffy in here overnight.  Then she scooted herself all the way to one side of the bed, closest to the nightstand and the lamp, to allow me plenty of room to climb in bed with her.  We did find ourselves facing each other, but that became a little less awkward when Sandy reached around to extinguish the lamp and the room fell dark.
"Good night, Sandy, and thank you again."
"You're welcome, Sonic.  We're both in this together, after all.  Now let's get some rest."